Short & Sweet: Trans and Nonbinary Authors
Aug. 9th, 2020 08:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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ladybusinessFor this edition of Short & Sweet I wanted to highlight stories by trans and nonbinary authors. It turns out that many of my favorite authors of short fiction are trans and nonbinary and their voices can always use some boosting.
For this rec post I haven’t selected stories based on themes. So this not collection of #OwnVoices stories about trans and nonbinary characters, although many of these stories have trans, nonbinary, or otherwise queer characters, or trans themes. Instead, I just picked stories I really love. It’s important to showcase #OwnVoices work, but to me it is more important to listen to marginalized voices and let them decide what they want to say.
"Love Might Be Too Strong a Word" by Charlie Jane Anders — Anders always comes up with delightfully wacky ideas that nonetheless pack a lot of feelings. This story set among aliens features multiple genders, relationship negationation, and public versus private relationships.
The Shape of My Name by Nino Cipri — This story features complicated families and time travel and figuring out your own identity and it's so so lovely!
The Book of How to Live by R.B. Lemberg — This one of Lemberg’s Birdverse stories, which takes place in a university town. It’s a lovely exploration of value, worth and making change.
"Light, Like a Candle Flame" by Iona Datt Sharma — What I love about Datt Sharma’s work is that they focus on doing the slow unexciting work that makes the world run. This story, which focuses on finding a site for a sewage plant, is a great example of that.
"Forestspirit, Forestspirit" by Bogi Takács — I really adore this story; it's just a wonderful combination of things I really love: ecological themes, found family, and shape shifting AI. The writing here is just so atmospheric!
Waiting on a Bright Moon by JY Neon Yang — This clever mystery is set against the background of a controlling space empire. Our main character Xin is an ansible and she uses her magical musical powers to transport goods around the empire. Except one day the thing that lands on the transport pad is a body. The investigation put many of Xin’s secrets at risk. I really love both the world building and characters in this one.
The Bonedrake’s Penance by Yoon Ha Lee — I love the descriptions and sense of place in this story about growing up in a fortress at the center of the universe. It's also about having to come to terms with terrible things in the past.
It was a challenge to pick just one story from each of these authors as they all have written many brilliant things, so please go check out the authors' other works! There are many amazing trans and nonbinary authors who are writing short SFF right now and we are lucky to have them.
For this rec post I haven’t selected stories based on themes. So this not collection of #OwnVoices stories about trans and nonbinary characters, although many of these stories have trans, nonbinary, or otherwise queer characters, or trans themes. Instead, I just picked stories I really love. It’s important to showcase #OwnVoices work, but to me it is more important to listen to marginalized voices and let them decide what they want to say.
"Love Might Be Too Strong a Word" by Charlie Jane Anders — Anders always comes up with delightfully wacky ideas that nonetheless pack a lot of feelings. This story set among aliens features multiple genders, relationship negationation, and public versus private relationships.
The Shape of My Name by Nino Cipri — This story features complicated families and time travel and figuring out your own identity and it's so so lovely!
The Book of How to Live by R.B. Lemberg — This one of Lemberg’s Birdverse stories, which takes place in a university town. It’s a lovely exploration of value, worth and making change.
"Light, Like a Candle Flame" by Iona Datt Sharma — What I love about Datt Sharma’s work is that they focus on doing the slow unexciting work that makes the world run. This story, which focuses on finding a site for a sewage plant, is a great example of that.
"Forestspirit, Forestspirit" by Bogi Takács — I really adore this story; it's just a wonderful combination of things I really love: ecological themes, found family, and shape shifting AI. The writing here is just so atmospheric!
Waiting on a Bright Moon by JY Neon Yang — This clever mystery is set against the background of a controlling space empire. Our main character Xin is an ansible and she uses her magical musical powers to transport goods around the empire. Except one day the thing that lands on the transport pad is a body. The investigation put many of Xin’s secrets at risk. I really love both the world building and characters in this one.
The Bonedrake’s Penance by Yoon Ha Lee — I love the descriptions and sense of place in this story about growing up in a fortress at the center of the universe. It's also about having to come to terms with terrible things in the past.
It was a challenge to pick just one story from each of these authors as they all have written many brilliant things, so please go check out the authors' other works! There are many amazing trans and nonbinary authors who are writing short SFF right now and we are lucky to have them.
★forestofglory.
